Magazine Attachments

Many magazines very often attach some extra inserts, posters or add pages that we can fold out so we have few pages in one piece. I remember few years ago when I bought some magazine about science and what I found  right in the middle of the magazine was a huge poster that I could fold out with the layers of the Earth's atmosphere. This kind of magazine attachments are great for those who are interested in particular subject. They can help in education as we can hang them on the wall and the information contained on the poster automatically perpetuate in our minds every time we look at it.

These are some examples of magazine attatchments: 

1980 Suzuki GS Motorcycle Models 

National Geographic 'Universe'

Sound Frequency Graph

The Elements

Linear Format

This is my final series technical guide presenting the process of recording the sound in homemade studio environment. The graph shows the whole process of sound going through the cable from one device to another. The linear fomrat reflects the sense of the stage by stage process taking place beggining from the output/ the source of the sound and ending on the output. We were supposed to produce minimum te images so no I will have to think about two more images that will visually relate to this series. Also I am going to consider the layout of an article and how my this series of ten images would be presented. 

Final eight images.. what are they?

These are my final eight photogrpahes of the equipment needed to record the sound. As the instrument I've chosen the guitar as I play and record the guitar mysefl so I can tell that I have a liitle bit of experience in this field. Also we can have more devices when recording this instrument (guitar amplifier, multi effect guitar pedals etc.) than during recording the vocals for example where all these preamplifier devices are not as necessary. 

Peavey 

Milestone® 3 Black

The series will start from the instrument which is the output/ source of the raw sound.

KORG AX5G

 Then the sound will travel through the cable to multi effect pre amplifier device which allows the player for initial adjustment of the sound and adding some effects like delays, reverb or distortion depending on the genre of music we play.

 Marshall G15R

This is where the amplified sound is produced and recorded by microphone placed right at the front of the membrane.

BEHRINGER Xenyx 802

This is a music interface which receives the signal from the microphone and sends it to the computer. Also it has an built in equalizer so we can make some initial adjustments and change the volume. Also one of the biggest advantages of this hardware is that we can connect and record few instruments at the time. 

Once the sound is recorded we can then move to the stage of post-production which is very demanding craft. There are lot of principles and aspects concerning mixing the sound. Most sofwares have the basic tools like compressors and equalizers which allow the engineers to work on the particular freqences and compress the very loud sequences of the sound wave and increase the sequences where the sound is very low to deliver the even, quality of sound.

 JVC AX-R562

The amplifier adds an power to the speakers so we can have a good reproduction of sound at the high volume to see  how our track sounds and wether the bass frequences does not cause any harm to the speakers.

Q Acoustics

 Good speakers should deliver a good quality sound to make the music engineer to work on the particular part of the frequencies range from low (bass) up to high frequencies (drum hi hat or squeaky guitar solos)

AKG K271 MKII

Headphones are great to get a good reference of how our track will sound at the consumers level as nowadays a lot of people listen their music on mp3 players etc. Also headphones are great when it comes to work on directionality of individual instruments (stereo) which can cerate an amazing spatality within the track.

Photoshoot

These are the results of my photoshoot. For the white back drop I used the white photographic reflector. I have used one speedlite with diffuser cap and wireless flash trigger which allowed me to locate my light source anywhere I wanted. We can still see some parts of the interior room around the edges of photographs as my background wasn't big enough but I am going to solve this problem at the stage of post-production. 

Example of an image

I'm going to be aiming for this kind of style in terms of technical approach. I will use a pure white background and soft, duffiused light so the object is evenly lit. The reason why I am going to be shooting against the white backdrop is because I want the viewer to follow the cables which will be running all the way through the whole series of images and I don't want the viewer to be distracted by anything else. Also my series is going to be more like a technical guide for music engineering magazine so I decided to keep it neat and present each equipment in a style of product photography. Also if I was to include some other objects or any kind of form in a background it would have to match perfectly with next image just like the cables going through from one image to another to keep the visual continuity. 

What is recording? ...and what do we need?

Sound is recorded by  microphone  that can detect changes in atmospheric pressure (acoustic sound waves) and record them as a graphic representation of the sound waves taht we can see on the computer screen. There are two main ways to record a sound. We can use either a microphone or the line-in method  which is the capability of a device to record line level audio feeds. I personally prefer the first technique as the sound recorded by microphone gains an extra acoustic quality of the interior in which it is recorded. 


What do we need to record a sound almost like in a studio?

1. Microphone to record a sound.

2. Music Interface - this can be either the mixer or external hardware like computer music card which will convert the analogue signal into a digital format which then goes straight to the computer.

3. Software- there are a lot of softwares available for music engineers one of the most popular ones are: cubase, Cool Edit pro, Adobe Audition, FL Studio, Sonar 5 etc. These are great tools to record and edit the sound to achieve a clean, mastered output.

4. Speakres - it is very important that we get an accurate reproduction of tonal qualities that we work on. In general speakers for studio recording are known as studio monitors or reverence monitors. They are  designed to produce relatively flat (linear) phase and frequency responses. In other words, it exhibits minimal emphasis or de-emphasis of particular frequencies so we can compensate for them.

Music Recording Magazines

I have chosen this theme for this module because recording my own music has been my hobby for last couple of years. Here I've looked at few magazines that are dedicated for those who are engaged in music of any kind.

1. http://www.soundonsound.com/ - Sound on sound magazine is a music recording technology magazine based in Cambridge, England delivering their monthly print magazine since 1985.

2. http://www.tapeop.com/ - Tape Op the creative recording magazine focusing on creativity and inspiration, rather than simple disscusions on recording equipment.

3. http://www.musictechmag.co.uk/ - Music Tech Magazine is the magazine targeted at engineers, producers and musicians and includes reviews of recording equipment and features articles on all aspects of music making

4. http://mixonline.com/ - Mix Magazine is the world's leading magazine for the professional recording and sound production technology industry. 

Editorial brief- Proposal

My concept for this module is to produce a series of 10 images of electronic devices utilized in home-made studios an also in more advanced workshops of sound implementation. Throughout my series of photographs I am going to present the process of how a single sound can be recorded and what actions it goes through before it becomes a finished outcome ready for output.

In terms of visual aspects I am going to shoot on pure white background to avoid any unnecessery objects within the frame. I would like my images to create a neat piece of product photography. I will use an external flash to light the objects in certain ways. To gain an appropiate, soft light and to avoid any harsh shadows I will difuse the light using softbox or some sort of dffusor. 

To create a sense of visual cohesion and continuity all images are going to be linked together by cables going through from one image to another.

An example of three separate images linked together with a cable.

* As we were supposed to think about how the layout and how we are going to present our images within an article I thought I will display my work in a linear format to reflect the sense of gradual process taking place. Also I think that an idea of cables going through the whole series creates great visual link between images.

Nowadays digital technology and the knowledge contained in the internet allows us to work and produce things at home at almost the same level as professionals. Whether it is photography or music or any other activity there is a very thin line dividing professional approach from amateur effort. 

I believe that many people have their own homemade recording studios and many people would like to start building their first studio and those people are going to be the main target audience for my project. The series of ten images I'm going to produce is going to be something like a guide and good introduction to a very difficulat craft that is recording a sound.

Module Introduction

' By developing your own editing skills you are expected to produce a series of strong images. Through tutorial feedback you will be required to submit a minimum of 10 and maximum of 15 images. These will be required for presentation in the usual format / by electronic projection / computer screen. The captions for each image will be needed for inspection.'

Final Submission 

Friday 30th November, Room HT013 @ 10.30am